Page:Reflections upon ancient and modern learning (IA b3032449x).pdf/54

 Vertue and Vice of all sorts, are judiciously stated by Aristotle, in his Ethicks to Nicomachus. Xenophon's Cyrus shews that he had a right Notion of all those Things which will make a Prince truly great and wise. The Characters of all those Vices which are immediately taken notice of in Civil Life, are admirably drawn by Theophrastus. Nothing can give a clearer Idea of one that has lived under Tyrants, than the Writings of Tacitus; in whose Histories, almost every Thing is told in such a Way, as we see that Ill Usage and Disappointments lead Men to censure and report the Actions of former Governors. Great Skill in all the Arts and Secrets of Persuasion appear every where in Demosthenes and Tullys Orations, in Quinctilians Institutions, and the Orations in Thucydides, Sallust and Livy. The Duties of Mankind in Civil Life, are excellently set forth in Tully's Offices. Not one Passion of the Soul of Man has been untouched, and that with Life too, by some or other of the Ancient Poets. It would require a Volume to state these Things in their full Light; and it has been done very often by those who have given Characters and Censures of Ancient Authors. So that one may justly conclude, that there is no one Part of Moral Knowledge,